From the Edge of the Galaxy
by I Am Your Singer 2006
Summary: A self-insertion into the world of KOTOR II.
1. Chapter 1

_Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords_ is probably one of my favorite computer games. I recently discovered two self-insertion fanfics based on the game, _I, Jedi Knight,_ written by L van Am, and _In A Jedi World Book 2 The Sith Lords, _written by Nyce. These stories have inspired me to write my own self-insertion story about the game. I'll try to include some original stuff, but right now I don't plan on creating any original characters. Depending on how the story goes, that may change. Since I'm still a novice, I would like to see constructive criticism in some of the reviews.

Chapter 1: Prologue

It was the end of a long day. I'll just leave it at that. It seemed like 1:00 A.M. was about as good a time as any to go to bed. Fortunately it didn't take me that long to go to sleep. I had an interesting dream that night, assuming it was actually a dream. With what followed afterwards, I really have no idea what to believe. So what happened? This "dream" started off with me being asleep, go figure. When I opened my eyes I sat up in bed and saw that I was in a room made completely out of metal. The walls were metal. The doors were metal. The bed supports were metal. About the only thing that wasn't metal was the mattress I was sitting on. I looked to my right and saw someone standing off to the side, someone wearing a simple brown robe.

"Ah, so you are awake," the figure said. It was a woman's voice. I couldn't tell at first because her hood was covering most of her face.

"Who are you? Where am I?"

"In a sense, you already know. You know the first answer, and by knowing that, the second one shall follow." The voice sounded all-too familiar.

"Kreia," I said under my breath.

She smiled slightly. "Yes, I had hoped you would recognize me."

"And I had hoped you would tell me why I'm here."

"You already know."

I rolled my eyes. I knew she wouldn't listen to me, but I figured I might as well make my displeasure known. "I'm really not in the mood for your circular answers."

"Your mind is clouded. You are…confused."

"Oh, really? And why do you think that is? Maybe it's because you're avoiding my questions, just like in the game?" I was really getting annoyed by now.

Kreia took no notice of my frustration, which really didn't surprise me at all. From what I remembered, she rarely raised her voice at the player, and her tone would change only if your actions upset her. She started speaking again.

"You are in a dream right now. When you awaken, you will find yourself elsewhere. You will be there for a reason, though I know not why. I must leave for a time, but you will find someone who will guide you."

"And let me guess, you're not going to tell me who it is, right?"

She left without saying a word.

"How typical," I muttered to myself. I closed my eyes and went back to sleep. No more dreams followed, thankfully. I'd had enough of those for a while. When I woke up again, I was in an entirely different room, this time I was sitting in a lower bunk in some other room. OK, this is getting plain weird. There was a bag next to my bed. I got curious so I looked through the bag. It contained some sort of uniform, change of clothes, and what looked like some money. When I looked at it more closely, I saw a familiar symbol. They were republic credits, and then it hit me. I was in the Star Wars universe. The other two items must have been a blaster and some kind of sword. I looked back and realized there were was a datapad next to my pillow. It had one unread message, and it said all I needed to know:

"_The bag next to your bed contains personal items, and you will need them if you are to survive this place. You will meet a friend shortly after reading this. Enemies won't be far behind. Stay on your guard."_

No sooner had I finished reading when I heard somebody entered the room and another familiar voice said, "Are you the new miner?"

I looked up to see who it was, even though I already knew. "Who are you?" I asked. Even if I knew who he was, I had to play the part in order to avoid drawing suspicion.

"Atton. Atton Rand," he said, sticking his hand out for me to shake. "So are you the new miner?" he asked again.

I quickly guessed that he was the "friend" mentioned in the datapad, and I had a pretty good idea where I was, but I had to double-check. "That depends," I said casually. "Where exactly am I?"

Atton scoffed. "Oh, you mean you didn't come here on purpose?" he asked, feigning surprise. "I'm shocked. I really am. This slice of paradise," he began while gesturing around the room, "is the Peragus mining facility. We got a report that said someone came in here on a damaged freighter yesterday. There were two other people on board, one was sent the morgue and the other was placed in a kolto tank. Anyway, there have been some accidents with the droids lately, and the administrator figured that since you're here, they need an extra man in the tunnels. Are you up for it?"

The idea of mining on Peragus wasn't exactly too appealing, especially considering what was going to happen soon. I remembered the game all too well. The lockdown began two days after the Ebon Hawk arrived on Peragus, and one day before the Jedi woke up. But I knew I couldn't just wait for it to happen. Maybe I could try to prevent it from happening.

"Guess I don't really have much of a choice, do I?" I shrugged. I quickly changed into the miner's uniform and said, "Alright, let's go." As we headed out of the dormitories towards the mining tunnels I said to Atton, "So what's causing the problems with the droids?"

"Not sure," he said casually. "But it probably has something to do with that Jedi."

"What Jedi?" I asked.

"Apparently that other survivor is a Jedi. Didn't know any of them were still around. Anyway, the Exchange has a bounty on live Jedi, and some of the miners wanted to collect on it."

"Oh yeah? Bet that went over real well with the administrator," I quipped.

"Right, so now I bet they're trying to cause a distraction and clear a path out of here. Not that I'd blame anyone for wanting to leave."

_Oh yeah, it's clearing a path, alright, kind of hard to for people to stop you when they're dead._ I knew I couldn't say that, because it would only cause trouble, so I shook my head and simply said, "Right." For the next several hours, Atton taught me how to mine the asteroid before Atton got a call telling him to report to the security officer. At the end of my shift I was supposed to report there, too. When I reported in to end my shift, he looked at me suspiciously.

"Were you working with Atton today?" he asked bluntly.

"Yeah, why?"

"Because earlier today he was locked up in the holding cell on charges of responsibility for some of the accidents that have happened here recently."

_Not true, it's that HK-50 unit. But if I say any of this, I'm probably going to draw suspicion to myself, and that's not going to get my anywhere._

"So what does that have to do with me?"

"Because Atton was working with you, you're being investigated as well. Until you're cleared to work in this facility, you are to be confined to the dormitory level unless the administrator or I call for you. This begins effective immediately."

I couldn't agree to this. Not with what was about to happen the next day. I had to fight for this.

"Officer, I think I must object to this. You see, Atton was-"

"If you do not comply with my orders, you will be locked up as well."

It was final. There was no way around it. There was nothing more I about it. I sighed resignedly, and went to the turbolift.

I knew the lockdown would start tomorrow, but I figured as long as I wasn't actually in the dormitories, would be able to survive. After a restless night I got into uniform, grabbed my pack and headed towards the exit opposite the turbolift to the administration level. I had no interest in running into Coorta and his miners or the droids that would dispatch them. Plus, I had to make sure I would run into the Jedi, otherwise I wouldn't be able to escape before the whole facility blows up. Closing the door behind me I brandished my vibrocutter, ready to take on whatever droids would come my way. A few hours later, I heard a voice call out, "WARNING: There has been a fuel detonation in the mining tunnels. Emergency Lockdown commencing. All personnel report to quarters and prepare for emergency venting countermeasures."

_OK, this is it._

For safety I kept a pair of mining lasers clipped to my belt, in case I dropped the vibrocutter. Suddenly the door flew open and a pair of droids crawled through. They weren't ranged so I was to bash them in with my vibrocutter. But then I found I couldn't close the door again. It was stuck open. I couldn't just stay a target, so I hid myself beside the doorway where no droids could see me unless they came through the door. I kept the vibrocutter ready. I stood guard and waited for the Jedi.

…


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Meeting the Jedi

I stood at the southern end of the dormitory level for what couldn't have been more than a day. I remember the character woke up the day after the lockdown began. I was basically trapped at that end of the facility because there was no way to get past the fire extinguishers without getting frozen in carbonite. Every now and then I would peek outside into the hallway to see if the Jedi had arrived. This time I peered around and saw three mining droids. They were probably the ones that killed Coorta. As soon as they saw me, their photoreceptors turned red.

_Oh, boy, another battle._

This time they were ranged, so I would need to rely on my mining lasers. I ducked behind the wall and began blindly firing shots at them, not even knowing if I was hitting them. As I peered around again one of the droids fired a shot right at me. Luckily I was able to duck down just in time to avoid the shot. Before the droid had another chance to shoot, I fired a shot straight at its central control cluster. The droid immediately exploded and collapsed in a heap of sparks. That left just two, who began firing at me again. This time I rolled to my left and fired another shot at a second droid, destroying it instantly. I immediately aimed the laser at the third droid, but before I had a chance to fire, it too suddenly exploded. Once the sparks faded away, I saw a woman standing in the open door way. She had raven black hair and bright blue eyes, and was wearing the same miner's uniform I was. I quickly guessed that she was the Jedi.

_So it's a female exile, interesting…_

"Oh, thank goodness, someone else survived," I practically shouted the words.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"Uh…Greg," I quickly said. _Hopefully my first name won't sound weird in the Star Wars universe, since names here sound nothing like they do on Earth._

"Alright, Greg," she said suspiciously, "how do I know you're not one of those miners who wanted to collect the bounty on me?"

_Is she light side or dark side?_

"You're the Jedi?"

"It sounded like everyone somehow knew who I was."

"Well, I, uh…" I knew there was no way I could prove I wasn't. "Do you know Atton?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"Because I met with him when I arrived here. If you trust him, you can trust me, too."

"Yeah, I know who he is," she conceded. "I don't exactly trust him, but I'm going to need his help in order to escape here. I suppose I could let you tag along until I can figure out where your loyalties lie."

"Sounds good, lead on," I said before retrieving my survival pack. "Now, uh, do you have an escape plan?"

"I'm trying to find a way into the hanger bay, but the only way there through the facility is sealed off by a containment field, and I can't shut it down. So I was looking for the administration officer to see if I could get the override code. What can you tell me about this level?"

"The dormitories are down this hallway and around a corner, and the turbolift back to the administration level is on the other side of the tunnel, but the fire extinguishers have gone rogue just like the droids have. Unless you've got a miner laser with a better range you run the risk of getting frozen by carbonite jets."

The Jedi reached into her own survival pack and retrieved what must have been an advanced mining laser. She headed towards the hallway and motioned for me to follow her. She quickly destroyed both fire extinguishers and continued forward. I followed right beside her, stopping in front of a computer console.

"Ok, the dormitories are just beyond that door, but because of the lockdown I can't open it, and I don't know how to access the computer, either."

She walked over to the computer.

"Hmm, this computer's been sabotaged, but fortunately, I think I can repair in just a minute, let's see now…" She reached into her survival pack and took out what must have been a repair part and began tinkering with the computer. After a few minutes the console beeped to life.

"Alright, we should have full access to console now, so let's see if we can…uh oh, that doesn't look good. Here, take a look at this."

I looked more closely at the security feed to see toxic fumes venting inside the dormitories.

"Is there any way you can shut it off?"

She grabbed a computer spike from her pack and hooked it up to the computer. Within a few minutes the fumes disappeared. It was pretty clear that all the miners were dead.

"Change of plans," she said. "I saw a ship dock here not too long ago, and a fuel pipe extended from the facility into the ships engine. If we can't find the code, we can bypass the containment field through the fuel pipe. So let's head to the turbolift."

"Alright, but there's more droids on that side of the level, plus two more of those fire extinguishers."

She nodded and grabbed her mining laser and signaled towards the hallway. After taking out the fire extinguishers and fighting our way through several droids in the mess hall, we reached the turbolift, where we found three dead miners, Coorta among them. While I kept an eye on the doorway to make sure any droids didn't sneak up on us, she went to access the computer to open to the turbolift.

"Hmm, apparently we need an access code to open the turbolift. Do you know the code?"

I shook my head and started searching the miners' survival packs to see if I could find the code somewhere. When I finished searching the last one I stood up and asked, "Are there any recordings in the computer's security camera?"

She checked the computer and said, "One, about five minutes after the lockdown began."

"Bring it up. Let's see if there are any clues in it."

The projector flashed to life and showed Coorta and two other miners trying to escape. When the mining droids arrived and shot them, I quickly said, "I think those were the droids we took out once you arrived."

From the recording we gathered that the miners trapped in the dormitories were sending a distress signal through the holo-transmitter inside the dormitory, and that the turbolift code had been reversed. I turned to the Jedi and asked, "I think we should investigate the dormitories."

The Jedi took control of the computer and ended the lockdown on the dormitories to open the door. We then agreed to split up and search the dorms separately. She took the west dorm, while I took the east dorm. After quickly dispatching the droid in the corridor, I ended the dormitory and searched the area for anything useful. I found a pair of holo-logs plus a blaster pistol hidden inside of the footlockers. Once I had searched the entire area I headed back to the west dorm to find the Jedi viewing holo-recordings from the administrator.

"Find anything?" I quickly asked.

"Apparently the distress signal was the turbo lift code, but I only got the first three numbers, and the code has five. How about you? What did you find?"

"Some more holo-logs," I said, holding them up. "One of them is from the dock officer, the other from the mining foreman."

I handed her both logs and she inserted both of them into projector. The foreman's log didn't have any useful information in it, but the dock officer's log revealed that the distress signal was on automatic playback, meaning that the transmission was still playing. The Jedi quickly deciphered the code and we made our way back towards the turbo lift. As we both entered the turbolift I turned to her and said, "By the way, I don't think I ever asked you what your name was."

"Meetra. Meetra Surik," she said with a smile.

"Well then Meetra, you ready to escape?"

She nodded and the door opened to reveal Kreia standing in front of us.

"Ah, so you _are _here," she said to me before turning towards Meetra. "I felt a disturbance in the Force. Our enemy is here, and we must leave at once."

"What enemy?" Meetra asked.

"The one that fired on the _Ebon Hawk_ as we attempted to rescue you…and he will not let us go without blood being shed. We need to make our way to the docking area on this level. I fear the airlock has already opened, and if do, we must be on our guard. If we cannot reach the _Ebon Hawk_, then we must find a way to escape on the ship that has docked here."

The three of us quickly ran to communications console, where Atton was still waiting.

"What in space is going on? Who's this? Another Jedi? What, did you guys suddenly start breeding when I wasn't looking? And how did you survive the lockdown?" he asked, turning his attention towards me.

"There's no time to explain, Atton. Grab a weapon and follow me," Meetra said before I could answer him.

"Uh, alright. I'm guessing that Republic ship that just docked isn't carrying friends of yours."

"I hope your talent for understatement is offset by your skill with a blaster. Otherwise I fear our time together will be short indeed."

"Yeah, and I'm also good at running and drinking, Your Majesty," Atton retorted. "And even if you two aren't big friends of the Republic, that warship is the only way off this station."

"Uh, I think we should go, now," I cut in. With Atton now in our little group, we ran towards the airlock.

"Good thing we have a clear run to the shi-"

"Threat: Master, perhaps I did not enunciate clearly the last time we spoke. I suggested that you should shut down, stay put, and wait for rescue."

The mechanical voice came without warning for the rest of them, but of course I knew it was coming. The HK-50 unit was standing not too far away from us, clutching a blaster a rifle while four mines floated in front of it.

"No, you were clear enough. I just don't listen to assassin droids," Meetra replied indignantly.

"Clarification: Assassin droid is such a crude term, Master, reserved only for durasteel drones uploaded with only the most archaic kill programs. The function I perform has been referred to as 'wanton slaughter.' I prefer to see it as a means of facilitating communications, resulting in the termination of hostilities."

"Whatever you say, but 'murder' still means 'murder' to me."

"Correction: I am not here to argue semantics, Master, so I will simply inform you that you are wrong, as were those recently-corrected miners," the droid snarled. "And although it appears that one of them somehow escaped me, it is of little matter now. I doubt he can offer you much help."

"I'm tired of listening to you. Prepare to be scrapped!"

"Resignation: Very well, Master. If inflicting pain is the only way to resolve this matter, then you leave me with no other choice."

The mines began floating straight towards us.

"Shoot for the mines first," I whispered to Atton. He nodded and took out the one of the far left, while I took the one next to it. Kreia picked up on this and took out the other two with the Force, while Meetra charged forwards and ran the droid through with a vibroblade. The droid suddenly froze before it suddenly began to vibrate.

"Get away from there! It's going to self-destruct!" I shouted.

Meetra barely managed to get out of the blast range as the droid's chassis violently exploded and what was left of the droid collapsed to the floor. After the sparks faded I stepped forward to examine the wreckage, with Meetra not too far behind me. "Some droid," I muttered to myself.

"We can still salvage some of the parts," she added, bending down and placing some of the parts in her survival pack.

I picked up the blaster rifle and motioned towards the airlock. "Come on, I don't think we can get out of here soon enough."

Meetra nodded and the four of us quickly made our way towards the airlock, and onto the _Harbinger_.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3: The Harbinger

The four of us ran through the airlock and onto the Harbinger, when Kreia suddenly stopped.

"Something is wrong. I sense no one on board."

"You _sense_ no one board? Do you sense any assassin droids trying to sneak up on us?"

"Everyone here has been slain, yet there are few signs of battle, no carbon scoring, no blaster fire. This place has been hit by assassins of a different sort."

"Then what the Hell are we doing here? We need to get off this ship. We were better off in the facility! And you two are supposed to be Jedi? You're both pretty poor examples of Jedi if you ask me."

"Oh really? Just what exactly have you learned about the two of them that lets you evaluate them so quickly? And what's your example of a Jedi, anyway?"

Before Atton could say anything more, Kreia spoke again. "If the assassin machine was correct, we cannot reach the hanger. Be silent, I need to think for a moment."

"Look, I don't mean to cast another shadow on this, but it wouldn't matter even if we _do _get to the _Ebon Hawk_. We'll need the orbital drift charts to make it past the asteroid field, unless you want the shortest flight of Peragus ever recorded."

"I actually _do _want that, but not in the way you're thinking."

Suddenly Meetra spoke up. "Well how did this ship get here?"

"Well they'd have to have the asteroid drift charts in their navicomputer in order to make it here."

"So why don't we just get their codes? That way we can escape with the Ebon Hawk."

"Well, we'd have to get to the bridge, and then…well, I guess that's the biggest problem we'd have to face."

"That is a sound plan for the moment. We should head there now."

But Meetra didn't move at all. For a brief second she froze in place, as if she were in another state.

"Our enemies gather while we wait here," Kreia said, her impatience showing clear in her tone.

Meetra snapped out of her trance and turned towards us.

"I'm sorry, Kreia. Atton's plan was good. Let's head to the bridge and get the drift charts."

"Alright, but this won't end well. Trust me," Atton said worriedly.

As the four of us began moving, I turned towards Kreia.

"Uh, we could have just started walking towards the bridge. I think she would've gotten the message," I told her. Kreia turned to me with her lip curled into a sneer.

"We cannot lead her. Ultimately she must walk her path, as you must."

The bridge wasn't too far from where we started. It was immediately to our right, and the navicomputer was located at the very front of the bridge. We were quickly able to download the orbital charts. The only planetary coordinates listed in the charts were for Telos. Meetra was about to lead us back from the bridge when Kreia stopped her suddenly.

"We should check the ship's logs. We might be able to find out what happened."

As Meetra scanned through the logs, I added, "It might be a good idea to upgrade our weapons, too. I don't think these mining lasers will do us much good once we're out of here."

There were four recorded logs. The _Harbinger _had picked up a distress signal from a freighter under attack by Sith forces, and the _Harbinger _moved to intercept, only to find the Sith warship empty, save for a single corpse, which was placed in a kolto tank. Then an unusual noise was heard from medlab. A woman screamed followed the sound of glass shattering.

"_I have come for the Jedi,"_ a gravelly voice shouted. Meetra cringed at the sound of his voice. He was coming for _her._

"We need to get out of here now," I said nervously. "Whoever said that is probably still on board. And if he's after you, he probably won't want us making it out of here alive, either."

"You don't have to tell me that," Meetra said with a shudder. The four of us ran out of the room as fast as we could and back through the corridor where we arrived. Once we reached the end of the corridor, I stopped suddenly. I knew what was about to happen. The other three noticed me and turned back.

"What is it? Why are we stopping?" Atton asked me.

Without saying a word I started running again, past the three of them. As I reached the door that led to the briefing room, I unsheathed my vibroblade and began swinging it wildly in the air. Doubtless the three of them thought I was crazy.

"What the Hell are you doing?"

Before I could answer, four masked Sith assassins in dark robes deactivated their stealth field generators, drew out blood red lightsabers, and moved to attack us. I didn't particularly like the idea of facing all four of them at once, so I turned and ran back towards the group.

"Time to even the odds!" I shouted, using one of Atton's attack phrases. By the time I reached them, Meetra and Kreia had drawn the own blades and moved to engage the assassins in battle. Atton stayed back and tried to pick them off with his blaster. He had already managed to shoot down one of them, so each of us could take on one on our own. I locked blades with the middle one. I tried to overpower him with a single blow, but he quickly blocked my attack. I countered by pushing my attack to my left, leaving his right side exposed. With his guard lowered, I kicked him in his shin, causing him to stagger back. Before he could counter attack I ran him through the chest with a quick strike, and he collapsed lifeless to the floor. Immediately I moved to the assassin on my right, forcing him to fight two of us at once. He quickly blocked my attack, but couldn't move his saber quickly enough for Meetra, who promptly ran him through. Kreia had already finished off the other Sith by that point. I motioned to the fallen lightsabers.

"Pick up their sabers. There are probably more of them here, and I don't think we should just leave those behind. Plus if you're both Jedi, you're probably more used to fighting with lightsabers anyway."

"I think it would best if you took one for yourself as well," Kreia said. I whirled around towards her. She simply held out one of the lightsabers towards me. Meetra and Atton were both staring at me.

"What did you say?"

"Take one for yourself. You will have use for it in due time."

I calmly took the lightsaber from her hand and attached it to my belt. Now armed with lightsabers, we made it down to the crew quarters. We ran down a long hallway past several rooms before Meetra stopped and turned to a door on her right.

"Are you alright?" Kreia asked with concern.

"I need a moment. This was my room."

"This was your room? When?"

"When I was stationed on the _Harbinger_," she answered.

"We don't have much time," Kreia reminded her. "Whatever you need to do, make it quick."

We waited for a few minutes while Meetra went inside her room to obtain a few personal items. Once she emerged from the room, she turned towards me.

"The armory is on this level, if you want your new weapons. Unfortunately, medlab, and mostly likely our assassin, is _also_ on this level, so we'll have to make it quick."

"Wasn't that already the plan?"

"I suppose it was."

"Then let's hurry."

There was a door at the end of the hallway. The door led to a small room with doors on both sides.

"Fortunately the hallway wraps around medlab, so we don't even have to-"

Her voice was cut off by the sound of igniting lightsabers.

"Aw, hell no," I muttered, igniting my own. Normally I would have been excited about wielding a lightsaber, but I had to push that thought aside while we were fighting. Even though a vibroblade could stand up against a lightsaber, I felt a lot more confident using my own lightsaber against them. Meetra and Kreia were much more proficient with lightsabers than I was. They both cut through the Sith with little effort. Once all four of them were cut down, we grabbed their lightsabers, too.

"Guess we're not going to be short on lightsabers by the time we're done here, huh?" I said casually to Meetra.

Meetra gave a small laugh and gestured to the door on the right.

"We can take either one of these doors around the medlab. The turbolift to the engine level is on the opposite side. Since the armory is on the right side, we should go through this one."

We ran through the doorway and along the circular corridor. There was another closed door at the end of the corridor. Unfortunately the door was locked and more Sith assassins confronted us as we turned around.

"I will silence them," Kreia said, reaching out with her right hand. Suddenly the four of were thrown back by a burst of energy and crashed into the wall, lifeless.

"Why didn't you do that earlier?" I asked rather annoyed while picking up their lightsabers.

"What sort of lesson would that teach you?" she asked me, equally annoyed.

"The door on the other side will be locked, too. It's standard procedure. The only way to the turbolift is through medbay. I just hope whoever that was in the ship's log isn't waiting for us."

"Doubtful, judging by the looks of things," I said.

Meetra turned back to me. "Huh?"

"If he's responsible for all this, I doubt he's just going to wait for us to come to him. It sounds more like he would look for us himself, face us directly. And if that's the case, he's probably not in medlab still."

"Which is why we cannot stay in one place for too long, we must keep moving," Kreia added.

"Like we're not already in a hurry to leave?" I muttered under my breath.

As I had guessed, medlab was completely empty, save for a broken medical droid. But once we made our way out of medlab, we were assaulted by four more Sith assassins, only to deal with them quickly. Meetra pointed out that the armory was straight ahead, and we could still search for some better weapons. Kreia kept watch by the door while the three of us placed every single blaster and grenade we could find into our packs. We also found three sets of armor, which I quickly gathered was the equivalent of what the game called the military suit, medium-class armor. Once we were finished changing, we quickly got to the turbolift and down the engine level. We had only taken a few steps forward when Atton shuddered.

"I have a bad feeling about this."

"No, really?" I asked sarcastically.

"Why, what's wrong?" Meetra asked, ignoring my comment.

"Can't you tell? Something's about to get real bad, real quick."

"_About_ to get bad? We've been jumped by who knows how many Sith assassins, we still haven't run into that…thing from medlab, and we're still trapped in the middle of an asteroid mine field! And none of that was _bad_," I asked incredulously.

"Well then we'll have to be careful, but we need to keep moving."

"Alright, but this won't end well. Trust me, when it comes to staying alive, I'm rarely wrong."

We continued to run forward until we reached the intersecting tunnel. Meetra stopped suddenly, shuddering. She slowly turned to her left to face an open doorway, and saw Darth Sion standing at the end of the corridor, lightsaber at the ready. He began to walk towards us slowly.

"I came to warn you, Jedi. You know not what path you walk," he said in a low voice.

"I think we've found our assassin," I said, for some reason feeling a need to state the obvious. Kreia brandished one of the lightsabers.

"This battle is mine alone. I am not defenseless. He cannot kill what he cannot see, and power has blinded him along ago. Run, I shall be along shortly."

She turned and ran to the door to face Sion. The door closed behind her. We had no other choice but to keep moving. After checking a few rooms, Meetra opened the door to the engine room. Once we entered the engine room, she accessed a computer and opened the engine hatch. Atton looked at her incredulously.

"Tell me you're joking. We are _not_ crawling back into Peragus through the fuel line, are we? That's just crazy."

"And the last few hours _haven't _been crazy? You need to trust me, Atton."

"Alright, but I know I'm going to regret this."

"You'd regret staying behind even more," I added, walking ahead.

Before we reached the entrance, Meetra screamed, dropped to her knees and grabbed her wrist.

"What's wrong? Are you alright? Damn it, hold on! It's only a little farther! Don't give up on us now!"

She stood up suddenly.

"What happened?"

"I don't know, but we need to keep moving."

"Alright, if you're sure."

Atton turned and let us back through the fuel line. We found a small metal case and a droid near an entrance valve.

"It's a utility droid, looks like it's been hit with an ion charge and dumped here," Atton explained.

The droid beeped to like once he saw us.

"I know, we ran into the 'protocol droid,' too. Are you alright?" Meetra asked.

The droid beeped in affirmation.

"Alright, let's go."

With T3 now in the group, Meetra picked up the case and led us through the fuel depot. After fighting our way up the ramp through several droids, we shut down the containment field at the top of the ramp went straight to the entrance to the hangar bay. Atton ran straight for the door, trying to find a way to open it.

"This door's magnetically sealed. I can't believe it. The ship's right out there and we can't get to it!"

T3 quickly realized the problem and gave off a series of beeps before going up the ramp and replacing the parts to open the door before rejoining us. We fought our way through another long set of droids and finally made it to the _Ebon Hawk_. Atton and I ran straight for the cockpit, while Meetra stopped in the main room to find that Kreia had somehow made it aboard before we had. Once she was done checking on her, Meetra went for the turret to repel the Sith who were trying to board the ship. Finally the engines were ready and the ship flew out of the facility. The ship was immediately hit by enemy fire.

"The _Harbinger _is trying to fire on us. If it hits us, we're dead. But if it _misses_ us, we're dead, too. That's great odds," Atton said grimly.

"Can't we jump to hyperspace?"

"Not with all these asteroids around."

"Can't we destroy them?" Kreia added, suddenly appearing from the main room.

"That'll take out the entire asteroid field, the colony, and probably us."

"It's too risky," I said.

"And there might be someone still alive on the facility. We can still get out of this," Meetra added.

"Hold on, this is going to get a little rocky!" Atton shouted.

Just then, one of the blasts from the _Harbinger_ hit one of the asteroids, causing it to explode violently. We all sat at the edge of our seats as the explosion set of a chain of explosions from the other asteroids. Suddenly enough of the asteroids had cleared for us to enter hyperspace safely. I collapsed into the co-pilot's chair while Atton stood up. A long conversation was coming.

…


End file.
